Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2000 23:19:59 -0500
From: Interfaith Working Group
Subject: IWG Lancaster Mennonite Letter Letter
March 6, 2000
Editor
Sunday News
8 W. King Street
Lancaster, PA 17603
Dear Editors:
We were disturbed by many facets of Rev. Steve Butts’
comments (March 5) concerning the Open Letter signed
by six-hundred forty-nine Mennonites. We were
especially disturbed by the section in which he wrote
that those who endorsed the statement “have bought
the line of the radical advocates for homosexuality
who want us to believe that a person is homosexual in
the same way that he or she is of a particular race
or gender.” He goes on to state that there are no
celibate homosexuals. The implication that good
people of faith have been somehow duped by outside
radical advocates is ridiculous; some of the most
dedicated advocates for equal rights for sexual
minorities are religious people, especially those
with a strongly-developed sense of justice motivated
by love. Those that we know are advocates for
people, not for their orientations and identities,
although they believe that their orientations are
just as legally, ethically, and morally valid as
heterosexuals’, and should not matter.
Having read the open letter carefully, there is no
verbiage comparing orientation to “race and gender;”
it is a criticism of the exercise of majority power
for the purpose of exclusion, an exercise of power
that has been used against many different kinds of
people throughout history.
Sexual orientation is defined by attraction, not by
behavior; many gay, lesbian, and bisexual people have
never have had a sexual relationship with a person of
their own gender. The question facing society is
whether we should be forcing consenting adults with
minority sexual orientations to choose between
heterosexual behavior or celibacy; or whether they
should be allowed to form socially-recognized
relationships with the person whom they have chosen,
and who has chosen them, a right that is assumed by
all heterosexuals and exercised by most.
Sincerely,
Barbara Lamond Purdom Christopher Purdom
Interfaith Working Group Coordinators
The above letter was sent on IWG letterhead listing 19 congregations and
religious organizations and 64 clergy from 16 religious traditions. You can
show your support by wearing an Interfaith Working Group shirt:
http://www.iwgonline.org/clothes/
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Interfaith Working Group
PO Box 11706
Philadelphia, PA 19101
http://www.iwgonline.org/
iwg@iwgonline.org
voice: 215-235-3050
fax: 215-232-0829